Spooky flights

On Jan 28, 11:34 am, Mxsmanic wrote:
Have any of you ever been slightly spooked while flying alone? (And
are you prepared to admit to it?)

Spooked? Yes, but not in the way you mean. When the engine pulls
the usual "You're in the middle of nowhere, so I'm going to burp once
or twice just to get your attention", then yes I've asked ATC for
higher just in case :-)

When I was much younger and drove long lonely distances at night, I
used to sometimes get that creepy feeling that there was someone
(thing?) in the back seat. I can't imagine how bad that feeling would
be in an aircraft Fortunately, planes don't do that to me.

Kev

Kev writes:

When I was much younger and drove long lonely distances at night, I
used to sometimes get that creepy feeling that there was someone
(thing?) in the back seat. I can't imagine how bad that feeling would
be in an aircraft Fortunately, planes don't do that to me.

Of course, now you'll have that to think about on your next flight.
Don't pick up any hitchhikers.

--
Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.

Have any of you ever been slightly spooked while flying alone? (And
are you prepared to admit to it?)

Right after I got my Private, I was called for a job interview at a
newspaper in Beloit, WI.

Hot **** new pilot me, I wasn't about to *drive* to my interview, no
sir. Even though I lived in Racine, WI, just an hour or two away, I
was going to exercise my rights as an airman, and save myself that
"long" drive. It was the dead of winter, and cold.

Well, the interview went well, and long, and I didn't get back to the
rental Cherokee 140 until after dark. Luckily I had a small
flashlight in my flight bag, but it was a moonless night, so I had
trouble just *finding* the plane on the dark ramp.

Once inside the plane, it was absolutely inky black, and after
starting the plane I waited an interminably long period for my eyes to
adjust and fully open up in the dark. This night vision, of course,
was instantly blown away the moment I turned on the landing light, but
it didn't matter -- soon I was trundling down the snow-drift-lined
runway, waiting for the magic of Bernoulli to begin...

As I lifted off, and the Cherokee's stock landing lights meager
reflection on the ground receded, I was suddenly and completely
engulfed in a dark, velvety blackness, darker than anything I'd ever
seen. It was darker than the darkest ink, like being in a cave far
underground. I could see nothing, I could feel nothing, I had no
sensation of motion or anything except the sound of the motor.

The dim lights of the instruments seemed to float in this ultimate
blackness, and I felt completely disembodied. I was floating either
in or outside my body -- there was no way to tell -- and I may as well
have been a brain floating in a bubbling vat of chemicals, this new
world seemed so foreign. It took every ounce of effort to come back
to my senses, and to get on the gauges.

Within 15 seconds I had climbed high enough to see enough lights to
create a "horizon", and everything snapped back to normal -- but those
were 15 very long (and weird) seconds, indeed.

Of course, then I had to land on my 2300' long by 30' wide home field
runway, in the dark -- but that's a different story.

;-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On 29 Jan 2007 19:51:11 -0800, "Kev" wrote:



On Jan 28, 11:34 am, Mxsmanic wrote:
Have any of you ever been slightly spooked while flying alone? (And
are you prepared to admit to it?)

Ive spent many hours flying alone and in the dark, both VFR and IFR.
I've never felt spooked. Rather it's quite peaceful and can be very
picturesque. Other times there is nothing to see at all and you have
to turn the stobes off to prevent "flicker vertigo". When the only
thing you see with each flash is featureless white it can be very
disorienting.

Spooked? Yes, but not in the way you mean. When the engine pulls
the usual "You're in the middle of nowhere, so I'm going to burp once
or twice just to get your attention", then yes I've asked ATC for
higher just in case :-)

When I was much younger and drove long lonely distances at night, I

When I was much younger I burnt the candle at both ends so much I
needed something to keep me awake while driving.

used to sometimes get that creepy feeling that there was someone
(thing?) in the back seat. I can't imagine how bad that feeling would
be in an aircraft Fortunately, planes don't do that to me.

Kev
Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

On Mon, 29 Jan 2007 19:51:11 -0800, Kev wrote
(in article . com):



On Jan 28, 11:34 am, Mxsmanic wrote:
Have any of you ever been slightly spooked while flying alone? (And
are you prepared to admit to it?)

Spooked? Yes, but not in the way you mean. When the engine pulls
the usual "You're in the middle of nowhere, so I'm going to burp once
or twice just to get your attention", then yes I've asked ATC for
higher just in case :-)

On long over-water flights we used to say that there was nothing to worry
about unless you could see sharks following the plane.

--
Waddling Eagle
World Famous Flight Instructor

A unique feeling is being dropped off at a remote airport late at
night then hanging around while the airplane leaves. The experience of
seeing that little cluster of lights go down the runway, lift off,
then go away has always touched something deep in me.

The other side of that coin is being the PIC. I never felt that after
dropping someone off, being sure he (or she) got to their car, going
out to the active and leaving. Instead it's a full, ego satisfying
feeling to climb 500 or 1000 feet, pressing the mike button and saying
"New York Center, Mooney XYZ is back with you, climbing out of one
thousand five hundred."


On Jan 30, 12:02 am, "Jay Honeck" wrote:
Have any of you ever been slightly spooked while flying alone? (And
are you prepared to admit to it?)Right after I got my Private, I was called for a job interview at a
newspaper in Beloit, WI.

Hot **** new pilot me, I wasn't about to *drive* to my interview, no
sir. Even though I lived in Racine, WI, just an hour or two away, I
was going to exercise my rights as an airman, and save myself that
"long" drive. It was the dead of winter, and cold.

Well, the interview went well, and long, and I didn't get back to the
rental Cherokee 140 until after dark. Luckily I had a small
flashlight in my flight bag, but it was a moonless night, so I had
trouble just *finding* the plane on the dark ramp.

Once inside the plane, it was absolutely inky black, and after
starting the plane I waited an interminably long period for my eyes to
adjust and fully open up in the dark. This night vision, of course,
was instantly blown away the moment I turned on the landing light, but
it didn't matter -- soon I was trundling down the snow-drift-lined
runway, waiting for the magic of Bernoulli to begin...

As I lifted off, and the Cherokee's stock landing lights meager
reflection on the ground receded, I was suddenly and completely
engulfed in a dark, velvety blackness, darker than anything I'd ever
seen. It was darker than the darkest ink, like being in a cave far
underground. I could see nothing, I could feel nothing, I had no
sensation of motion or anything except the sound of the motor.

The dim lights of the instruments seemed to float in this ultimate
blackness, and I felt completely disembodied. I was floating either
in or outside my body -- there was no way to tell -- and I may as well
have been a brain floating in a bubbling vat of chemicals, this new
world seemed so foreign. It took every ounce of effort to come back
to my senses, and to get on the gauges.

Within 15 seconds I had climbed high enough to see enough lights to
create a "horizon", and everything snapped back to normal -- but those
were 15 very long (and weird) seconds, indeed.

Of course, then I had to land on my 2300' long by 30' wide home field
runway, in the dark -- but that's a different story.

;-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On Sun, 28 Jan 2007 08:34:09 -0800, Mxsmanic wrote
(in article ):

Sometimes some people get spooked when driving out in the middle of
nowhere (especially the desert southwest of the USA) for various
reasons. Obviously darkness, isolation, and a lack of signs of
civilization and humanity can play a role in getting one's mind to
wander in the wrong directions. These must all be greatly magnified
when flying alone at night in relatively unpopulated regions.

Have any of you ever been slightly spooked while flying alone? (And
are you prepared to admit to it?)

Not while flying alone. It is easier to spook your fellow crewmembers. Not
that I would do such a thing, of course, but odd noises, little puffs of
smoke coming out of odd panels, ghost stories on dark spooky nights with St.
Elmo's fire crawling up the windscreen, instrument needles moving in odd
ways: these things are fairly easy to engineer or take advantage of. But as I
say, I would never dream of it. "Um, was that prop flux?" "WHERE?!?" There.
There it was again." "I DIDN'T SEE IT, WHERE?" Things like that seemed to
happen a lot to new command pilots on their first long overwater, for example
-- the "cherry ride."

--
Waddling Eagle
World Famous Flight Instructor

Tony writes:

A unique feeling is being dropped off at a remote airport late at
night then hanging around while the airplane leaves. The experience of
seeing that little cluster of lights go down the runway, lift off,
then go away has always touched something deep in me.

I can say the same for watching just about any aircraft take off.
Rotation is always the best part, as the wheels rise off the ground
and the aircraft leaves the runway, and goes up and up until it's
invisible.

In the days when the U.S. was still a free country, I liked to go to
the airport just to watch aircraft take off and land. I even liked it
when I was very young: I would insist that my parents take me to the
noisy, open observation deck so that I could see planes take off and
land. And I liked the smell of kerosene because it reminded me of
airplanes.

--
Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.

In the days when the U.S. was still a free country, I liked to go to
the airport just to watch aircraft take off and land. I even liked it
when I was very young: I would insist that my parents take me to the
noisy, open observation deck so that I could see planes take off and
land. And I liked the smell of kerosene because it reminded me of
airplanes.

I don't know what part of the country you lived in, but we still do
all of that today, right here in the USA. Any time we'd like!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck writes:

I don't know what part of the country you lived in, but we still do
all of that today, right here in the USA.

I lived in the Great American Southwest, right near a Class B.

Any time we'd like!

You're lucky.

--
Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.